


Living On The Highest Shelf

by plinys



Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-07
Updated: 2015-01-07
Packaged: 2018-03-06 13:37:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3136385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plinys/pseuds/plinys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I could have killed you."</p>
<p>"Good evening to you too, pal."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Living On The Highest Shelf

**Author's Note:**

> for the anon on tumblr who asked for me to write "Howard sneaking into Peggy's apartment"

To any other person it might have seemed as though nothing was out of the ordinary.

However, Peggy had long since learned the signs, the subtle things to look for, to check that would lend her privy to the secret comings and goings of the people around her.

And, more importantly, to be able to tell when somebody else had disturbed her space.

It wasn’t uncommon.

Angie, who was her neighbor and self-proclaimed dear friend, would often slip into Peggy’s room when she was away at work leaving her nice letters of encouragement or borrowing this one that which she needed for her next audition.

Usually Peggy didn’t mind, and even though she couldn’t help herself from worrying that one day something would happen to her in a similar fashion to what had happened to her last roommate, she had been unable to discourage the other woman’s friendly affections.

This time though she could tell it was not Angie.

The door, which had formerly been quiet close to the wall beside it was now jammed just a hair apart from the wall, a clear sign of somebody having entered her room without the aid of a spare key.

She takes one glance down the hallway, checking that none of the girls have turned towards her direction, before her fingers instinctively move to her hidden firearm, slipping it out of its hiding place and ready to fire, as she opens the door.

Shutting her door makes a sound that seems almost too loud in the silence of her apartment, and her gun is up and aimed the second her eyes settle on the _thing_ that should not be there.

A man hunched over her desk, with a stack of files and paperwork that had most certainly not been there before.

In the darkness she can’t quite make out who it is, but she doesn’t need to a moment later where a voice speaks up in a low and familiar drawl, “don’t be so dramatic, pal.”

“That’s your response? You break into my apartment, nearly get shot and tell me not to be _dramatic._ ”

“I’m not armed,” he just answers.

Of course, he’s not.

One of the most brilliant men she’s ever had the misfortune of meeting, and he can’t even manage to keep himself armed when half the country’s secret services are calling for his head.

“I could have killed you,” she tells him, having half the mind to still do it, but instead setting gun down forcefully on the table as though to prove her point.

He looks up from his notes then, gives her that signature grin of his, and replies, “good evening to you too, pal.”

“I’m serious, Howard,” she replies, “you shouldn’t be here.”

“In your bedroom or in the country?”

“Either, both,” Peggy pauses considering for a moment before settling on, “both.”

He just grins at her again, all sure of himself, and offering her no answers, and repeating the word “both” as though it’s the strangest thing he’s ever heard.

“They don’t allow men above the first floor,” she informs him.

“I was told that by a number of young ladies,” Howard agrees, “though as you can see rules don’t apply to me. A few flowers, my soon to be patented Howard Stark smile and-“

“Talking about yourself in the third person makes you sound vain.”

“I _am_ vain,” he insists, “don’t bother acting as though that is any news to you.”

She hopes her eye roll is enough to show how she feels about that sentiment.

There’s only one person in the world that would be proud to be called vain, and he was sitting at her desk still smiling at her as though he’s done absolutely nothing wrong, when in fact he’s done everything wrong.

“This would have been a lot easier had you accepted my gift.”

“You mean that extravagant waste of space that you call a second home?”

“I’m hurt.”

“You should be.”

“I mean, my second? Honestly, Peggy, it’s more like my fifteenth,” Howard corrects her, “though that’s not what you meant at all is it?”

“It really isn’t,” she agrees, “I believe the point I was making was that you ought not to be here unless you want one of my coworkers to show up and sweep you away to some federal prison.”

“Ah, and that’s where you’re wrong.”

“Am I now?”

She didn’t like that look. It had shifted from the grin that he practiced for the ladies and the politicians, to the one she was more familiar with during the war. It was the _I’m planning something you won’t approve of_ look.

“No, no, no!”

“Now, be a good pal and-“

“No.”

“Peggy.”

“Howard?”

“It’s like you said ‘ _no men above the first floor,’_ nobody will suspect a thing.”

Certainly there was merit in that point.

Peggy would eventually need to get the truth out of him in regards to how he managed to get up here, as well as why he was here in the first place, but there would likely be time for that later since Howard seems to have made himself at home with no intention of going anywhere anytime soon.

She could continue to fight him on the matter, but it seemed futile knowing that she would eventually give in. Howard had a way of being incredibly persistent that would have been annoying on any other man, but was slightly charming on him. She had yet to decide if telling him that would inflate his ego or wound him.

“I don’t suppose I have a choice in the matter?”

“It’ll just be a few days, once I sort a few things out and Jarvis readies my beach house in-“

“I’ll take that as a _no._ ”


End file.
